The Great North-West. 431 



" I really think one cannot get a better farming country than this. I 

 tell you, sir, I have cropped five acres of land on my farm for six years 

 successively without a rest, and this year a better crop I never saw. 

 That is soil for you. I think immigrants will be satis6ed with this country 

 when they come here. You can't say too much in praise of it. 1 wish 

 ^hem all good luck that come this way. All I say is, come, brother 

 farmers; come and help us plough up this vast prairie country. You can 

 raise almost anything in this country." — George Taylor, Poplar Point, 

 Long Lake. 



" I have run a threshing machine here for the last five or six years, and 

 the average of wheat is from twenty -five to thirty bushels, oats forty to 

 sixty bushels, and barley thirty to fifty." — Jabez Geo. Bent, Cook's Creek. 



" I have over one thousand apple trees doing very well, and also 

 excellent black currants." — James Armson, High Bluff. 



" Having only had two years' experience here, I cannot do justice to the 

 country as I would like to do, for I believe it to be a good country. I was 

 nine years in Ontario, and in Ireland up to manhood, and I prefer this 

 country before either of them, taking the average of everything. The 

 three crops I have seen enables me to believe that any man that works in 

 this country will like the place, for he will have something for his trouble." 

 — Edward J. Johnston, Springfield. 



" Those who have no farms of their own, come here and farm. Bring 

 no horses ; oxen are the things for a new settler." — James Airth, Stonewall. 



"The weather, both in spring-time and harvest, is very suitable for 

 both operations. As a general rule the rainy season usually commences 

 after seeding, in June, and settles again before harvest, and continues dry 

 through the fall and until snow sets in in the latter end of November, allow- 

 inggood timeforfall ploughing and threshing out grain. I would advise settlers 

 in a general way to start with oxen, as they are less expensive in cost, and 

 keep the first year at a less risk than horses. I would advise them not to 

 bring any implements with them, but procure the best of 'all classes here, 

 as" they are especially adapted for this country." — Jno. Ferguson, High 

 Bluff. 



" Flax and hemp have been grown successfully here and manufactured 

 by hand, many years ago, both by myself and several other old settlers. I 

 have seen stalks of hemp grow twelve feet high." — John Sutherland, 

 Senator, Kildonan. 



" Wild hops grow to a larger size than I ever saw in any hop-field in 

 Ontario."- — S. C. Higginson, Oakland. 



